Business Panel To Undergo Changes

Hartford's Economic Development Commission met for the first time in seven months Thursday.

The first order of business: get four new members sworn in to fill vacancies on the 11-member board.

The second: get a briefing from the mayor that the commission probably will cease to exist by next year.

Mayor Eddie A. Perez told commission members Thursday that by July 1, he plans to fold the quasi-public agency back into city hall.

``We won't have the commission as currently structured,'' he said.

The commission is a semi-private group, created by the council in 1999 with the goal of filtering the city's business procurement efforts from the politics of city hall.

Though it served only an advisory role on city policy, the commission often serves as a first stop for prospective developers and businesses who are seeking information, tax abatements and financing advice.

The commission, when it was created, was intended to be both publicly and privately funded. But the private funding from local corporations was slow in coming, and the city increasingly had to take on more of the financial burden.

Last spring, the city council allocated more than $500,000 to the commission, officials said Thursday. Still, Perez said, the commission is expected to run a $250,000 deficit in the current budget year ending June 30.

Perez's announcement on a restructuring of the commission came as no surprise to members. It had been expected since at least February, when the commission, at the direction of Perez, decided not to renew the contract of its then-executive director.

Under the city's new charter, which took effect in January, the mayor is now the city's ``principal strategist'' on economic development matters.

The commission, charged with luring businesses to the city, will be incorporated into the newly created Department of Development Services, which incorporates planning, zoning, housing and licenses and inspections.

``For Hartford, I think it makes enormous sense,'' said John Palmieri, the director of development services.

The new agency will absorb the staff of the economic development commission by next year. Until then, the city must look for ways to keep funding the commission.